Martin Galvin in a letter to the Irish News welcomes inquest findings against the British state's role in Ireland. 

Better 47 years late than never, the Coroner's Court ruled British troopers had no justification for shooting unarmed Derry teen Seamus Bradley, then watching him die without medical treatment. Gregory Campbell loudly complained court rulings using law and evidence, are unfair to British crown forces and their state narrative. It seems that British legacy killings are indefensible, unless facts and law are buried under mythology.



Campbell is regurgitating the policy which created this legacy impasse. Nine months before Seamus Bradley's murder, Brigadier General Frank Kitson suggested "law should be used as another weapon in the government's arsenal ... little more than a propaganda cover for disposal of unwanted members of the public."

Behind this propaganda cover, the crown legally rubberstamped the 'disposal' of Seamus Bradley, Ballymurphy Massacre victims, Springhill-Westrock victims and so many others. Meanwhile they lauded British troops and the Royal Ulster Constabulary, for using "minimum force" only "within the rule of law" to "uphold law and order". They then said British forces were responsible for only 10% of the north's killings, washing their hands of collusion with loyalists in murders.

The DUP and Westminster Tories seem to think that twenty-five thousand suspected Republicans inside British prisons was not enough, but the handful of British troopers charged for murder were too many for victims' relative to look for more.

British officials, however, did not calculate that relatives might overcome decades of British delays, denials and waiting for family members to die or lose heart. As the truth emerges in courtrooms, British officials resort to pious words about "rewriting history" or "pernicious counter narratives." In plainer English, they fear that proceedings like the Bradley or Ballymurphy inquests are rewriting lies with truth and destroying British fairy tale myths about their dirty war in Ireland.

The Bradley inquest held that British troopers opened fire on an unarmed Derry teen, then concocted a cover story about firing a machine gun. It may make out crimes of murder and perjury. The Ballymurphy Massacre victims were ruled guilty of crimes which justified killing them. Should we not expect those findings to be rewritten with facts that destroy the British version? Meanwhile evidence mounts that Britain's crown forces were complicit in murders carried out by loyalist agents.

We will either see an amnesty or banners going up for more so- called heroes like "Soldier F."

Martin Galvin is a US Attorney-At-Law.


Inquests Correcting History And Destroying British Fairytale Myths

Martin Galvin in a letter to the Irish News welcomes inquest findings against the British state's role in Ireland. 

Better 47 years late than never, the Coroner's Court ruled British troopers had no justification for shooting unarmed Derry teen Seamus Bradley, then watching him die without medical treatment. Gregory Campbell loudly complained court rulings using law and evidence, are unfair to British crown forces and their state narrative. It seems that British legacy killings are indefensible, unless facts and law are buried under mythology.



Campbell is regurgitating the policy which created this legacy impasse. Nine months before Seamus Bradley's murder, Brigadier General Frank Kitson suggested "law should be used as another weapon in the government's arsenal ... little more than a propaganda cover for disposal of unwanted members of the public."

Behind this propaganda cover, the crown legally rubberstamped the 'disposal' of Seamus Bradley, Ballymurphy Massacre victims, Springhill-Westrock victims and so many others. Meanwhile they lauded British troops and the Royal Ulster Constabulary, for using "minimum force" only "within the rule of law" to "uphold law and order". They then said British forces were responsible for only 10% of the north's killings, washing their hands of collusion with loyalists in murders.

The DUP and Westminster Tories seem to think that twenty-five thousand suspected Republicans inside British prisons was not enough, but the handful of British troopers charged for murder were too many for victims' relative to look for more.

British officials, however, did not calculate that relatives might overcome decades of British delays, denials and waiting for family members to die or lose heart. As the truth emerges in courtrooms, British officials resort to pious words about "rewriting history" or "pernicious counter narratives." In plainer English, they fear that proceedings like the Bradley or Ballymurphy inquests are rewriting lies with truth and destroying British fairy tale myths about their dirty war in Ireland.

The Bradley inquest held that British troopers opened fire on an unarmed Derry teen, then concocted a cover story about firing a machine gun. It may make out crimes of murder and perjury. The Ballymurphy Massacre victims were ruled guilty of crimes which justified killing them. Should we not expect those findings to be rewritten with facts that destroy the British version? Meanwhile evidence mounts that Britain's crown forces were complicit in murders carried out by loyalist agents.

We will either see an amnesty or banners going up for more so- called heroes like "Soldier F."

Martin Galvin is a US Attorney-At-Law.


7 comments:

  1. Why was there collusion Martin? If there was a 'shoot-to-kill' policy what use did the Government have for bothering to use Loyalists?

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  2. Simple. The use of Loyalist goons as Britain's mudflap was, from a British perspective, a sensible outworking of the "Ulsterisation" policy. That policy enabled London to spin it's honest broker narrative, to avoid international embarrassment from a prolonged policy of openly shooting Paddy's and of course took their boys out of harms way. The English at the start of the Troubles were quite naive about propaganda, as hey were used to getting away with murder in eg Kenya etc as the Empire played out. Increasingly, they were also fighting a propaganda war and the Loyalists came in handy. You sound young and naive.

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  3. Steve

    One does not cancel out the other any more than a land offensive ought to cancel out air attacks or vis versa.

    Martin

    The Brits were not niave about propoganda as if it was some new concept -a study of World War 1 will quickly reveal how astute they were in the use of propoganda -it helped them win the war as it did the 2nd one too.

    I faguely remember a guy called Kitson wrote the book (1970) on propoganda and counter-insurgency which followed a previous book by another Brit General called Thompson (1967) -I think what you mean is they miscalculated world opinion and forgot they were fighting in European cities and towns rather than in jungles and wilderness.

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  4. The security forces and loyalists worked in common purpose to keep this part of Ireland British. There should be little surprise there was collusion to serve this common purpose.

    The Security Forces wanted to undermine the IRA which they did through their use of informers. The security forces and the IRA had conflicting purposes which is why scuppering the IRA made more sense.

    Through leaked intelligence, montages, thwarted investigations, reluctance to arrest, sourcing arms etc. the British bolstered the loyalist project.

    The difference beteen security force involvement with loyalists and that with Republicans is stark. One to bolster, one to hinder. Loyalists used to boast of collusion particularly when politically expedient.

    Republicans and loyalists both acknowledged collusion and shoot to kill. Slowly the British government is doing likewise. Not unexpected and quite in the mould of their tactics elsewhere on the globe.

    Martin Galvin describes the direct Security Force killing rate as being 10% of the conflict and rightly refers to collusion. I would like to politely point out that a better way of looking at it was they were directly responsible for over 30% of non-republican killings. I think that paints a starker picture considering, as Martin points out, collusion.

    Steve R, are you seriously denying there was collusion or shoot to kill? No-one is saying it was a scorched earth policy. Irish-America had a role, amongst others, in preventing that. I am not saying the British would have favoured scorched earth, I don't believe they did, but they did carry out similar in many parts of the globe.

    I don't see the merit in complaining about shoot to kill unless the victim was unarmed, which in many cases they were. No attempt to arrest in so many situations and very, very few arrests. Not shoot to kill? Come on.

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    Replies
    1. Simon,

      Of course not, I've seen it first hand. I had two questions for Galvin though, the first was asking why collusion took place in the first place and the second was why bother with security force action AKA shoot to kill if the whole point was Ulsterisation?

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  5. Comments under the moniker Unknown will no longer feature if not accompanied by a distinguisher.

    ReplyDelete
  6. For the record the comment by " is not from Martin Galvin. There might be some confusion about that

    ReplyDelete